#which is otherwise entirely new to me

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

[a-commas-a-pause]

Just had a look and I have a theory, but I'm afraid my theory doesn't really have anything to do with a connection between spots and placentas (though you could draw a connection, if necessary - something about cell-to-cell communication, I suspect). I think it's probably more about the protein in question being a really good switch.

Let me explain what I mean by that. The protein in question is an aminopeptidase, which means that when it's expressed in the cell, what it does is it looks for other target proteins (with a specific structural motif) and then when it finds its targets, it chomps a bit off the end of them. This might result in the degradation of the target, or it might just be required for the target to do something else (like go latch onto DNA and express yet another gene, or like mediating pigment production). The point is, what this particular sort of protein actually does is nothing to do with placentas or spots. What this protein does is that in cells where it's expressed, it goes around turning off (or on) all the other proteins that have a particular motif/flag.

It's kind of like if I had a bunch of unrelated tasks I needed to do, but I gave myself a biscuit for every completed task. The biscuit isn't related to any of the tasks and it also doesn't particularly signify that the tasks have anything to do with each other, but it is still absolutely true that I will not do either task if I do not get my biscuit.

Now, as to why it doesn't affect placental function in cats (or coat colour in humans, I guess)? Well, if I had to guess, I'd say while this gene has been around for a long time, its original job was probably neither of those things. It probably did something else yet again, or several other things.

As long as genes' expression zones aren't crossing over, it's actually fine for them to have multiple roles. If A turns on both B and C, but B is only even expressed in the first place in eyes and C is only expressed in fingers, it's fine that A is crucial to two entirely separate processes, one for making fingers and one for making eyes. You're not going to end up with eyes on your fingers because for that you'd also need B (and X Y and Z probably as well). It's also fine if the zones of expression are only separated temporally - maybe B is expressed early and C late, and A gets turned on twice throughout development, once early to activate B and once later to activate C. And it's turned off in the middle to prevent it from accidentally activating D, which instead needs to be activated by B.

Lots of genes have a huge number of seemingly unrelated roles like this - it's called "moonlighting" and it's turning out to be way more common than we first thought. If you've already got a switch that works, why make another one from first principles? Now this is kind of the equivalent of "well we only have one single bed for two people, but it's fine because one of us works night shifts so we never need it at the same time", that is to say, Not Perfect. But natural selection doesn't optimise for perfect, it optimises for "good enough to not die long enough to successfully pass on your genes" (usually, ish, look this reblog is already really long and we don't need to get into this too right now), and the timeshare solution is plenty good enough, so it's what ends up happening like 90% of the time minimum. It's really really hard to make new things and really really easy to reuse old things, basically, and evolution always takes the easiest option in the same way that streams don't flow uphill.

There are some genes that shouldn't be able to moonlight because they turn on whole SUITES of other genes - genes where if you express them in the wrong place they DO put eyes where your fingers should go, and we call these master regulators. But also, this isn't like. A true dichotomy. Master regulators also do seem to moonlight sometimes. And a gene that's a master regulator of something in one clade might do something completely different in another clade. The GABA genes, which are neurotransmitters in animals, actually have a bunch of other signalling functions in plants, especially to do with establishing cell polarity (how does the cell know what direction to grow in). Turns out GABA's just a pretty handy little signalling molecule that's super versatile for cell-to-cell signalling, and multiple different branches of the eukaryotes have taken advantage of that fact!

was browsing thru papers about animal coloration and learned that a gene that helps make the placenta in humans (the thing that keeps you alive when you're a fetus in the womb) also exists in cheetahs, but in the cheetahs, it just controls the placement of their spots

How does THAT happen?!

[canisalbus]

I just recently started following you so i don't have the full lore of your murderous gay religiously traumatized doggos, BUT, from my understanding, they are Italian and i don't know what part of Italy they are from, yet i can't help headcanoning Vasco as Tuscan, while Machete is probably from some part of Veneto. And as an Italian who has heard Tuscans and Veneto dialet, well it's an hilarious mental image.

Vasco is indeed Tuscan, Florentine to be specific. He comes from a wealthy and influential noble family that has lived in Florence for centuries. He's proud of his roots, and it's usually easy for strangers to tell where he's from. He's a resonably successful politician and has worked as an ambassador and representative of Florence on numerous occasions.

Machete is originally Sicilian (ironically about as far from Veneto as possible), although he was taken to mainland at young age and has lived in several places since then, before ending up in Rome. The way I see it, he exhibits very little local color, his demeanor and (even though Italian hadn't become a standardized language yet) way of speaking are formal, neutral and scarcely give away any hints about his personal history, at least in the 16th century canon.

[madsway]

now that i've taken in the entire show and am about to rewatch simply because i can............... i'm so pissed that dave erickson got fired because damn........

[stephantom]

I’d need to watch it again to confirm this, but I’m pretty sure that Thomas Becket is the only character who independently initiates touch with Henry?

There are plenty of people whom Henry touches, and it’s almost always possessive or threatening: the villager woman in the first flashback scene, the Saxon peasant girl (and possibly the old man? I think he prods at both of them with his riding crop), Gwendolen (holding her shoulders/neck), the French prostitute (kissing, leaning over, sitting on, slapping her butt), his sons (pushing and kicking them), the bishop (strangling), his barons (clutching onto one, tapping one’s head to indicate his vapidness), and Thomas too—(clasping his shoulders when he realizes Thomas is hurt, holding his hand to put on the chancellor ring).

Interestingly, I don’t think we ever see Henry touch or be touched by his mother or his wife. There’s the moment when he grabs/kicks their needlework, and later on he knocks all the plates off the table, possibly vaguely in their direction—so there are two physical interactions which are violent but still sort of… distant? And still the direction is just Henry to them (in terms of physicality, anyway—verbally, they do initiate conversations/fights with him).

Does anyone touch Henry? There are the monks who whip him in the end, but Henry has ordered them to do it. Likewise, there’s the servant/valet/page who begins to wipe him dry in the bath scene, but again, that’s someone performing a duty. Thomas Becket though, cuts in and takes over the drying, and the dialogue tells us explicitly that he’s not expected to do this, and doesn’t have to (“You’re a nobleman—why do you play at being my valet?”) but Becket seemingly wants to do it, and he knows Henry likes how he does it: enthusiastically, confidently, warmly, and freely (“No one does it like you, Thomas”). He towels Henry’s head, helps Henry put on his boots, and then casually uses Henry’s legs to push himself up to stand.

There’s the scene in Henry’s tent, after the French prostitute has left and the two of them are sitting on the bed: Becket sort of leans in and briefly clasps Henry’s arm where it’s lying in his lap, casually and warmly.

There’s also the getaway horse ride, where Becket is holding onto Henry, arms wrapped around him, and they’re both laughing and smiling. Henry’s shirt actually falls open a little and Becket’s hand winds up on his bare torso.

And then there are the thwarted attempts at touch, after the split: the two scenes where Henry accuses Becket of not loving him. Both times, Becket moves toward Henry and reaches out to touch him, and both times, Henry moves away and tells him to keep his distance.

They’re quick little things, but if they are actually the only instances of anyone touching Henry affectionately (or even of their own volition) that we see over the course of the movie, it does support an impression of Henry as fundamentally isolated—maybe there is truth to his claim that Becket is the only person who’s ever loved him.

What’s tragic is that 1) Henry doesn’t really know how to express love himself (see: Henry expressing nothing but violence and entitlement to everyone else around him, and even to Becket for the most part), and 2) Becket’s love, albeit huge in Henry’s world, is conflicted and unfulfilling—for both of them.

Becket might be the only person who’s dared to reach out to Henry and meet him on something close to a human level, and Henry loves him for it, but why does Becket do it? Part of it may just be an instinct of Becket’s to fulfill a need where he sees one, if he can, and if it benefits him. I think it’s so interesting that Henry seems obsessed with the question of whether Thomas really loves him, when it seems the truth might be that Thomas actually doesn’t know; maybe it’s an unanswerable, even nonsensical question to him. Like, what else could he do? I don’t know. “Insofar as I was capable of love, yes I did [love you].” But the fact that his last words, unwitnessed and private, are, “Poor Henry.” Fuck me up.

Ok, that last paragraph got away from me and now I can’t stop. Tempted to draw comparisons to “Beauty and the Beast” (this is a sad version where no magical transformation happens… unless you take a particular Catholic stance and consider that both of them maybe took real solace and meaning in Thomas being made a saint and that Henry maybe found real absolution through his penance).

I also want to compare all of this to “The Lion in Winter”, where it feels like, rather than a story about one lonely monster in a castle full of people he sees as objects, it’s a whole microcosm of traumatized and power-hungry people, reaching out for power and security and love and stabbing each other in the back, over and over. (Like, of course his mother and wife and kids have complex feelings for him—some of which involve love!) I think that depiction is better and less myopic, more true to life and probably a more accurate portrait of the historical figures involved (even when it comes to Henry and Becket—Becket was of that world too, after all), but I think I’ve rambled enough about all of this, so I’m going to end this post now. I’ll just say that there’s something nevertheless appealing about the boiled-down fairytale melodrama of “no one else ever loved me but you!”

[leafy-m]

So I hit my 700th edit for the WHA wiki today, because I am a totally normal person

[moongothic]

There's like a part of me that realizes that I've written so much Crocodad Meta that at this point I should probably just compile and condence it all into like a giant Propaganda Post

'Cause like. Sure it's all still on my blog, but few people are going to go digging through all the crap I've posted in the past few months for all the Crocodad Evidence, so just showing it all into a single post would make for like. IDK something I could use to make a compelling argument for why Crocodad could be real

(Also it would be more like, Crocodad evidence you might find on a more meta/narrative level, like on-going themes and Oda's story telling tropes/habits etc. Other people have already made posts that breakdown and analyze Marineford and compile all the subtle details+easter eggs etc so I wouldn't even go into any of that. I mean SURE I could regurgitate all that info too but it'd be easier to just link to someone else's post instead and save myself some time lol)

But also.

Do I really want to spend an obscene amount of time making that post. Do I really want to do that.

[theres-whump-in-that-nebula]

Wanting to look at true crime stuff to learn about psychology and criminal investigation but only finding a bunch of people who idolize and “uwu-ify” serial killers and school shooters 😬 fucking YIKES

[magnusmodig]

||. ambition is telling myself i'll finally sit down and write the "deconstructing the Frozen Vault" meta bc man ppl clearly don't understand 2011 era thor at all

[beananium]

can i be a hater for a second

[amatres]

anyway my personal ranks of origins backstories just in the game by themselves is brosca and tabris at the top, aeducan at the bottom. cousland i will admit is pretty impactful but i still feel like, as wild as an option it would have been, that a cousland warden should had the option to solo rule. they are from the only other teryn in ferelden and it's even said that it was considered for bryce to rule so like! come on!

aeducan is at the bottom because it so tightly locks you into siding against bhelen, which i suppose is fair for brosca being so skewed in behlens favor bc of rica, but brosca is just Good so i forgive that, while aeducan is just suffering.

i still stand by my idea that the 'noble' dwarven origin shouldn't have been the second aeducan child, they should have been the second aeducan's second in place of gorim. that way there would have been more room for roleplay. also the second aeducan child would have been a secret third option for ruler of orzammar that you would encounter with the legion of the dead that they joined after being kicked out.

you would have to both do the legion of dead quest to give them a noble caste, and also have high as hell coercion for it to work but it would really cool and also so funny to do. that said the origin just by itself is pretty fun, love being backstabbed by my second favorite baby brother from the dragon age franchise

mahariel and the magi warden are in the 'i like them but they don't feel as impactful' as much as it hurts me. they're both just kinda there, however that said if the game let you recruit jowan into your party that would bring the magi warden up much higher. alas.

[museenkuss]

sometimes I think about all the meals I could make if I didn’t live with my mother (who doesn’t eat garlic, onions, leek, fish, shrimps, cream, anything that’s “too fatty” or anything that differs too much from food she’s had before) and my father (who doesn’t want me to use more than MAXIMUM two pots at a time and doesn’t consider instant food like canned soups, prepped sauces, frozen pizzas or spice blends worth buying). Also I’m vegetarian so that’s another food group eliminated entirely.

[ct-hardcase]

love star wars on this fine week but I genuinely think all disney social media accounts are being told to exclude resistance from any promo

[danny-chase]

well maybe. if Jason actually had seen Dick be a jackass, but Dick waited till Jason went to school to pick fights with Bruce

was totally the hot-head in that fight 🙄

and made up with Jason for treating him harshly by the end of their first issue

(all the above is from Batman 1940 #416, so if you cry about Jason’s character being retconned, then this is the source you want to pick from)

In contrast Dick took longer (aka more than 1 issue) to warm up to Tim

The New Titans #61

Wasn’t a fan of Cass taking up Barbara’s old mantle

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #120

And was definitely not a fan of Damian attempts to up-surp Tim’s position as Robin 

Nightwing (1996) #138

Dick isn’t this magical golden person that meets you, instantly decides you’re an uwu baby that needs big brothering, and takes you under your wing. He’s had initial dislike for ALL of his siblings when they’ve entered into his family. So what changed?

1. With Jason it was really about Bruce, which generally fandom gets right, but what they get wrong is Dick and Bruce festering and fighting about it for long periods of time. Dick saw Jason was Robin, showed up, was rude to Jason, and stormed off. He calmed down, waited till the next day when Jason was at school, confronted Bruce about the situation, and made up with Jason that night. It was literally a 2-day long event. Not months of arguments and Jason playing the divorced child of Dick and Bruce. Dick also wasn’t living in Gotham at the time, and didn’t really have a need to be around, so he wasn’t, and Jason wasn’t alive for many more issues after this anyways, but was on the Teen Titans reserve list, so ig he did stuff with them

2. Tim kept coming back. Accounts that Tim bullied Bruce and Dick into accepting him as Robin are kinda dumb. Essentially Tim kept showing up and seeking them out, and they were like. Fine this kid is cute, also lets train him so he doesn’t fucking die, because he tried to rescue us from Two-Face single handedly

3. Barbara voiced her approval for Cass to take on the Batgirl mantle. It was literally as simple as that

4. Time. So much time. Dick and Damian aren’t this fluffy huggy pair that fandom makes them out to be. They genuinely didn’t like each other at first. Damian didn’t respect Dick, and while Dick respected Damian as a person, that doesn’t mean he necessarily liked him, because Damian was a massive brat (affectionate) at 10 years old. And so yeah. Dick made snide remarks to Damian at times, and engaged in banter/taunting with a 10 year old. Eventually they learned how to communicate in a better way. But it took time

So yeah, ALL of Dick’s siblings know he can be an asshole, they’ve all been on the receiving end of his disapproval. But all of them got past that and know he’s a good person, who won’t let grudges or first impressions get in the way of how their relationships develop. If Jason asked Tim or Damian if they thought Dick was an asshole, they’d probably reply “yeah sometimes, but after you get to know him, he’s really great” or something along those sentiments. anyways this is the fanon interpretation of Dick and Jason’s relationship that drives me nuts: that Dick was a massive bitch to poor widdle Jason and no one believes him because he’s all hugs and kisses when it comes to Tim and Damian. nah. sorry but Jason’s not special, Dick disapproved of all his siblings initially. And then five seconds later he was like actually [x] is my kid now, and if anything happens to them I’ll kill everyone in this room, and then myself

I just know Jason is so fed up with the rest of the Batfam not knowing how much of a shitbag Dick was when he was a teenager. I know this man looks like a complete nutcase when he tries to convince Tim or Damian that Dick had his asshole phase, too. Don’t believe his fucking golden boy, depressed, running on fumes, burnt out, “I’d give everything and then some for the good of the world” act. He’s a lying liar that lies. It’s ALL lies.

Mr. Professional Older Brother was a goddamn menace to society, and Jason Todd is gonna PROVE IT, DAMNIT.

“I know what you are,” says Jason.

“Lol,” says Dick. “Lmao.”

[blondepomeranian]

Experienced a real bummer at work. Got sad about it.

Then got pulled into a meeting with my sup. It was all good stuff, excellent news, and really delightful and engaging conversation!! Life is so good again!!!

Go to the bathroom and see that my make up was smudged on one side of my face, giving me a thick black line across the already dark circles under my eyes.

Welp. Guess I'll die!!!

[makeitpoppy]

being a very brave, big girl today

(27 yo grown ass woman is organizing her health check docs, blood test results, mental health diagnosis comprobation and vaccination cards)